Here is a closer look at the smaller button and the texture:

Yesterday, I started a larger project. I got the idea from Somersett Home. I’m creating a wall hanging of my grandma’s homes. Ultimately, there will be four images of her homes attached to the tapestry I found. I’ll decorate with some great trim, buttons, maybe some old keys and attach to a dowel that will allow them all to be connected and hang like little houses on the wall. These are works in progress, but I’ll post anyhow. The photo on the left is the house Grandma lived in in Long Lane, MO. The one on the right is when my grandma visited the house a few years ago just before it was torn down. I love the fact that she got to see it one last time. Obviously, time took its toll on the house!

Tonight we celebrated my grandma’s 80th birthday. Above is a photo of her on her grandma’s porch near what was called Billy Goat Hill in the North End of St. Joe. When she was five, her family moved to Long Lane Missouri, which is actually as it sounds… a long lane out in the middle of no where. At 16 she got married and by the time she was 20, she had three kids. By 22, she was pregnant with her fourth. She tells the story that they had no electricity or running water, and had to walk to get pails of water to do her laundry, cooking, etc. I can’t imagine what it must have been like. She’d walk to the well, holding my aunt Mary’s five year old hand, pull a red wagon with my aunt Dorothy and my mom in it and have a bucket in the other hand. Imagine doing this several times a day, pregnant with three small kids in tow!

I’ve been writing my family history, and my grandma has been invaluable in helping me. In addition to the family history, I’ve been writing how the actual research of my family has changed my life. In honor of Grandma’s birthday, I’m posting a small section of that story here:

” I began to interview my grandma and ask her about her childhood. She told me wonderful stories that are as much or more meaningful than the dates and names. For example, she told me about the time her younger brother, Leroy, who is known to most of us as “Sonny”, was bitten by a copperhead. Grandma and Sonny had to walk several miles to school each day. They usually carried their shoes since they were expensive items, and in order to preserve them as long as possible, they carried them while walking and put them on once they got to school. As they were walking through the woods, Sonny suddenly said, “Oww, something stung me.” Grandma looked down and a copperhead was ready to strike his bare foot again. Grandma grabbed him out of the way of the second strike. Knowing that copperhead venom could easily kill him, she picked him up and tried to carry him to help. He was heavy, though, and she couldn’t carry him far. He had to walk, leaning in to her as she tried to support him, keeping him as calm as possible. They left the wooded area and got to the road. There, several men working a county road crew were standing. One of the men knew exactly what to do. He used his pocketknife to cut open the bite and began to suck the poison from Sonny’s wound. Since they had a work truck at their disposal, they asked who their parents were and Grandma told them. They took Sonny to the hospital where my great-grandpa Chapman met them. Grandma went on to school. As she was telling me this I couldn’t imagine the fear she must have felt. Not only had a copperhead bitten her little brother, but also she watched as two strange men drove off with him. How she functioned at school the rest of the day is beyond me, but it speaks to her strength and her love of school. Their lives in Dallas County in Southern Missouri was much different than my life is right now. Indeed, this probably explains my grandma’s deep hate of snakes, too. She told me that later they heard the man who had helped Sonny got very sick. He had rotten teeth, which allowed for the venom he sucked from Sonny’s wound to go directly to his own blood stream. In that brief moment the man took his own life into his hands, but he didn’t think twice as he sliced open Sonny’s foot and began to extract the venom.
It was during one of these conversations that my grandma mentioned one of her best friends, Ila Junkins. Grandma had shown me a photo of their one-room schoolhouse at Cedar Ridge School. She said, “I sure would like to know where Ila is. It’s been 40 years at least since I saw her.” It was November 2004, and I immediately thought that finding Ila would be a great Christmas gift for Grandma. Indeed, I knew with the great fortune I’d had at finding information for my genealogy, that this would be one of those requests that I could answer myself. I went straight home and began to search. In an hour I had the email of a young woman who was researching my Evans line in Dallas County. Knowing that many in the area were related, I sent her an email asking not only for information on my Evans family but if she knew anything about the Junkins family. Of course, she did. Within in a few hours she had responded. Ila, the last she knew, was living in California, but her family had lost touch with her and she didn’t know where in California she lived.
I quickly looked up addresses for Ila in California. My grandma had told me her married name and her husband’s name, and there I found Ila. On November 30, I dropped a letter in the mail and on December 4, Ila sent a response:
“I was thrilled to get your letter. It made my day and often wonder about your grandmother Margaret. We grew up together and had many happy times. I’m sure we could talk for many hours catching up. I remember her birthday is in August, the 29th, I believe. Her mother, your great-grandmother, made the best ever potato salad. Cleo and husband stayed at my folks farm in the summer of 1965 while my folds went to southern California to visit us…”
It’s difficult to capture what happened next. I grabbed the letter and drove immediately to my grandma’s. I told her I had an early Christmas gift and handed her the letter. She looked at it questioningly at first, and then began to cry. She had Ila’s address and phone number. A couple of days later, they spoke on the phone, and Grandma called to tell me they had talked nearly an hour, a long time for my grandma to be on the phone. Since then, they’ve stayed in contact, writing occasionally and talking on the phone. Grandma always makes sure to tell me when she’s talked to Ila; it’s her way of telling me that she deeply appreciated what I did that day. Like the incident with Carla and the bible, I felt what I’d done was the right thing. My grandma had made a wish, wanting to know about Ila all these years after they’d last spoken. Finding her was within my power, and I had no other choice but to make that wish come true. It worked out beautifully, and when I think of the happiness I saw on my grandma’s face that day when I handed her the letter, I have to smile.”

Happy 80th Birthday Grandma!

Needless to say, with these wonderful finds, I’ve been camped out at my dining room table, writing, writing, writing. So, if you need a writing prompt today, call the oldest living relative you know and ask them to tell you a story about their life. When I did this with my grandma, I got numerous stories. The best one was about the day her little brother was bit by a copperhead on their way to school. These kinds of stories take us to another time and place. They make us appreciate where we are now, too.

Now, to create a wonderful piece of art out of the photos that fell into my hands this week. I’m so excited.